Glossary

Assignment

The link between a product and a product class, including its status and history. Created automatically when a product is created. One assignment exists per product per taxonomy.

Auto-assignment

The process that tries to find a product class for a product, using the configured strategies (customs code, or a machine-learning model that reads the product texts). It runs once, when a product is created — never on later edits. It can set a status of Assigned, Rejected or leave Unassigned, but never Approved (which always requires human review).

CustomsAI

The name shown on some screens (the AI search mode in the Assign dialog, the Minimum CustomsAI Compliance setting) for the machine-learning model behind auto-assignment. Many languages are supported; German works best, followed by English.

eClearCode

An eClear-specific extension of the public customs taxonomies: a child class below an official code (e.g. 0201100021-80-007) used where official codes are not fine-grained enough to differentiate VAT treatment in all countries.

Global product

A product that can be linked to none, several or all shops. Master data and classification apply to all linked shops at once.

Local product

A product that belongs to exactly one shop. Changes and classification apply to this shop only.

Merchant product attributes

Custom attribute fields you can define for your tenant (text/number, optionally language-specific) and fill per product — usable in bulk upload columns and custom assignment rules.

Product class

A category in eClear's product taxonomy that groups products that are alike from a VAT/customs perspective, identified by its code (e.g. 4201 = saddlery and harness for any animal). The deeper (longer) the code, the more specific the class. A class with no sub-classes is an end node.

eClear's product taxonomy / tariff tree

eClear's ordered set of product classes — an extended version of the official customs taxonomies TARIC (EU, 10 digits), TARES (Switzerland, 8 digits) and UKGT (United Kingdom, 10 digits), with extra classes (eClearCodes) where finer VAT distinctions are needed.

Taxonomy selector

The dashboard dropdown that chooses which product taxonomy you are working on, labelled by region (EU — TARIC with Northern Ireland, CH — TARES, GB — UKGT without Northern Ireland). Which entries appear depends on your subscription; with a single taxonomy the selector may not appear at all. Classification happens independently on each taxonomy.

Shop

A sales channel of your tenant (e.g. an online store). Shown in the dashboard's Shops overview; local products belong to exactly one shop.

Standard rate fallback

When a product is not (sufficiently) classified, the country's standard VAT rate is returned instead of a class-specific rate. Marked FALLBACK in the CSV export.

Sufficient product class

A class specific enough to determine VAT rates for all supported countries. Assigning an insufficient class yields status Rejected instead of Approved.